Chapter 2 - Four Faces in the Mirror
The Tribeca apartment was silent when I arrived forty minutes later.
It was one of several properties my family owned, but I rarely used it. The rooms were too clean, too expensive, too carefully designed to make anyone feel at home. Marble counters. Floor-to-ceiling windows. Furniture chosen by an interior designer my mother trusted more than most people.
That night, for the first time, it looked useful.
Mara stood near the kitchen island in the oversized gray sweater I had left in the guest closet. Her server’s uniform had been folded neatly on a chair. The boys sat at the dining table in matching pajamas, eating grilled-cheese sandwiches my driver had picked up from the only restaurant still open.
Milo had already finished his sandwich and was trying to negotiate for Max’s.
“You had two bites left,” Milo argued.
“I was saving them.”
“For what?”
“For later.”
“You can’t save grilled cheese forever.”
“Watch me.”
Mason and Micah burst into laughter.
For a moment, I stood in the doorway and watched them.
They were loud.
They were messy.
They were very clearly six years old.
And each one had my eyes.
Mara noticed me first.
The warmth in her expression disappeared immediately.
“Boys,” she said, “finish your food.”
The boys grew quiet.
I took off my coat slowly.
“I’m not here to fight.”
“You canceled an engagement party for us.”
“I canceled an engagement party because I didn’t want to get engaged.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No,” I said. “It isn’t.”
Mara looked at the boys.
“They need sleep.”
“I know.”
“You can sleep in the guest room,” I added. “There are two beds. The boys can share the larger one.”
Milo frowned. “Where will Mom sleep?”
“She can take the other bed.”
“And you?”
“I’ll stay in my apartment upstairs.”
That seemed to surprise Mara.
I had expected her to accuse me of trying to control the situation. Instead, she simply looked tired.
“Thank you,” she said quietly.
It was the first kindness she had offered me since I saw her again.
I did not deserve more.
Later, after the boys had gone to bed, I found Mara sitting alone in the living room. The city lights reflected across the dark windows. She held a mug of tea with both hands.
I stayed near the doorway.
“Can I ask you something?”
She gave a humorless smile.
“You have six years of questions.”
“I know.”
“Then ask the first one.”
My throat tightened.
“Are they mine?”
Mara closed her eyes.
For several seconds, she said nothing.
Then she whispered, “Yes.”
The answer should have made me happy.
Instead, it made me feel sick.
Six years.
Six birthdays.
Six Christmas mornings.
Six years of school pictures, fevers, scraped knees, first words, first lost teeth.
I had missed all of it.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.
Mara looked up sharply.
“Why didn’t I tell you?”
“I called you for weeks.”
“No, Callum. You called the number your mother gave you after she changed mine.”
I froze.
Mara’s face hardened.
“Your mother came to my apartment three days after you left for London. She told me you had decided to marry Brielle Cartwright because the Whitaker board needed the merger between your families.”
“That was six years ago. I had not even met Brielle then.”
“I know that now.”
“She told you I was marrying Brielle?”
“She showed me documents. A ring. Travel arrangements. A letter supposedly written by you.”
My jaw clenched.
“I never wrote you a letter.”
“She told me you were too weak to say it to my face.”
Mara looked down at her tea.
“And I believed her because I was twenty-three, pregnant, scared, and already feeling like I did not belong in your world.”
“You belonged with me.”
“You did not make me feel that way.”
The words landed quietly.
But they were true.
My family had never approved of Mara. She had worked at a bookstore when we met. She was brilliant, funny, stubborn, and completely uninterested in being impressed by money. My mother hated that she could not buy her approval.
And I had spent too much time trying to keep peace between them.
I had believed silence was neutrality.
It had not been.
“Did my mother know about the pregnancy?” I asked.
Mara’s eyes lifted.
“Yes.”
My chest went cold.
“She knew before she came to see me. I had taken a test that morning. She found it in my bathroom.”
“What did she say?”
Mara’s mouth trembled.
“She said a Whitaker child would never be raised by a woman like me.”
I looked toward the hallway where my sons were sleeping.
Then back at Mara.
“What happened after that?”
“She offered me money.”
“Money?”
“To leave New York. To disappear. To never contact you again.”
“And you refused.”
“At first.”
The room became silent.
“Mara,” I said, “what did she do?”
Her eyes filled.
“She threatened my father.”
I stopped breathing.
My mother knew Mara’s father had been in debt after a stroke left him unable to work. She knew he depended on Mara. She knew exactly where to hurt her.
“She said the Whitaker legal team could make sure he lost his home,” Mara whispered. “She said I could fight her if I wanted to—but that your family had resources I could never survive.”
“So you left.”
“I left because I thought it would protect my father and my babies.”
My hands curled into fists.
“And when I tried to find you?”
“She had already told you I abandoned you.”
“Yes.”
Mara swallowed.
“I sent letters. Every month at first. Then every year.”
“I never got them.”
“She made sure you wouldn’t.”
Anger rose inside me so fast it felt like fire.
My mother had not simply manipulated a relationship.
She had stolen my children.
A soft sound came from the hallway.
Micah stood there in the doorway, rubbing his eyes.
“Mom?”
Mara immediately stood.
“What is it, sweetheart?”
“I had a bad dream.”
She crossed the room and lifted him into her arms.
Micah rested his head against her shoulder, then looked at me.
“Are you going to make us leave?”
The question broke something inside me.
I shook my head.
“No.”
“Are you mad at Mom?”
“No.”
“Are you our dad?”
Mara went still.
So did I.
I looked at the boy in her arms.
At the same gray-blue eyes I had seen in the mirror.
“I think I am,” I said softly.
Micah considered that.
Then he yawned.
“Okay.”
Mara carried him back to bed.
I remained alone in the living room, staring at the dark city.
At 11:18 p.m., my phone rang.
My mother.
I answered.
“Callum,” she said smoothly. “Where are you? The Cartwrights are offended.”
“You knew.”
A pause.
“What are you talking about?”
“You knew Mara was pregnant.”
The silence on the other end lasted just long enough.
Then my mother said, “That girl is trying to manipulate you.”
I looked down the hallway.
Four boys were sleeping in rooms that should have been theirs from the beginning.
“No,” I said quietly. “You are.”
May you like
And I ended the call.
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